Data Entry Keyboard

ABSTRACT

An apparatus for entering alphabetic data into a computer or other electronic or mechanical devices with a keyboard wherein the alphabet is arranged in a logical order, a keyboard wherein the vowels are grouped together, a keyboard wherein the vowels are all placed on the left side of the keyboard, a keyboard wherein each vowel has the same color code, a keyboard wherein the consonants are arranged in groups, a keyboard wherein the consonant groups are arranged from left to right in alphabetic group order, and a keyboard wherein each consonant within a group has a specific color code; wherein two groups of consonants have the same color.

TECHNICAL FIELD

This invention relates generally to the field of keyboards and morespecifically to an apparatus for entering alphabetic data into acomputer or other electronic or mechanical devices.

BACKGROUND

The invention of the typewriter is credited to C. Latham Sholes in 1867.Thereafter, Sholes designed the QWERTY keyboard to prevent typewritersfrom jamming. Sholes designed the QWERTY keyboard in about 1872. It wasan unpatented universal design. Before this design each manufacturer hadits own keyboard layout which made uniform learning of typingimpossible. Sholes later filed for a patent U.S. Pat. No. 558,428 (1896)for a typewriter but the keyboard was not shown in the patent or part ofits claims.

Hereafter, the term “keyboard” shall refer to all devices inputtingalphabetic letters regardless whether the devices be typewriters,personal computers, laptop computers, smart phones or smart pads or anyother type of mechanical or electronic entry of data.

Another of the first keyboards is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 185,714 (1876)had a layout of four rows of keys. The bottom row contained the vowelsin order, A, E, I, O, U, Y. The next row up started with B, C, and D.The consonant keys were arranged in alphabetical order from left toright, bottom to top row. The keys were arranged in diagonal columns toallow each key to throw a lever. This was apparently the last attempt toarrange the letters in an order that was systemized and intuitive toEnglish speakers. This keyboard was easier to learn. It was intuitivebecause it separated the letters into easily recognizable groups thatone learns when first encountering the alphabet. The twenty-six lettersof the alphabet are learned in a standard alphabetic order A, B, C, D,etc. The distinction is then made between vowels and consonants with thevowels being learned in the same order as they appear in the totalalphabet, A, E, I, O, U. However, this design had the limitation thatthe keys were in five rows making a long keystroke for the top at bottomletters of the keyboard.

The success of the Remington No. 2 in 1878, which used the QWERTYkeyboard, led to the universal adoption of QWERTY. It was an open designand is hailed as one of the successful examples open standards for anindustry. This layout was designed to slow down the rate of theoperator. The early mechanical system could not keep up with the ratethe keys were being struck. The operator could press keys in sequencefaster than the machine could return the previous key to its startingposition. There was no consideration given to the ease of learning thekeyboard.

The QWERTY keyboard was arranged to scatter the most struck keys to slowdown the speed of the operator. For instance, a frequently pressed vowel“a” is pressed by the small finger of the left hand, which is a weakfinger and the mechanical typewriters of the time required a forcefulstroke to bring the key up to strike the ribbon and make an impression.The QWERTY keyboard was laid out in three rows with 10 keys in the toprow, 9 in the second row and 7 in third row with the keys arranged indiagonal rows to allow the keys to depress a lever.

However, the QWERTY keyboard did have one significant design featurethat has been kept because of its efficient. The design of the keyboardwas of three rows with 10 letters in the first row, 9 in the second and7 in the third. This creates a middle home row for the fingers to restand then every key is then either in the home row, or one row up ordown.

The QWERTY keyboard to a beginning typist is completely random and eachletter has to be painfully memorized by repetition. It takes weeks ifnot months to train a typist to a high level of skill. Despite thissignificant limitation, the ubiquitous presence of the QWERTY keyboardon all typewriters made changing to an easier to learn systemcommercially unfeasible.

Two patents U.S. Pat. Nos. 433,765 (1890) and 560,572 (1896) have theQWERTY keyboard layout, but neither patent refers to the arrangement ofthe letters on the keyboard layout as a claim. As mentioned above, theQWERTY keyboard layout was an open design and not patented. U.S. Pat.No. 943,466 (1909) offered a non-QWERTY keyboard wherein the mostcommonly used letters of the alphabet were arranged in the center. Thiswas apparently the first keyboard arrangement designed to increasetyping speed receiving a U.S. Patent.

Typists were regarded as high skill employees and typing speed andaccuracy was considered a desirable feature of employees. Subsequently,there was a search for a faster keyboard. August Dvorak was granted U.S.Pat. No. 2,040,248 (1936). The keyboard was designed for maximum speedby carefully measuring the distance the operator had to go to type eachletter. Ease of learning the keyboard was not considered. Again, to abeginning typist the keyboard was a random arrangement of letters andthe finger to type each one had to be learned by rote and extensivepractice. The Dvorak keyboard was top to bottom, 7, 10 and 9 keys ineach of three rows. This differentiated it from the QWERTY design of 10,9, and 7. The Dvorak keyboard never made significant headway fortypewriters because the marginal difference in speed was more thannegated by the long period of training necessary to change from onerandom arrangement of letters to another random arrangement of letters.

Starting in the 1970's with the introduction of the personal computerthe typing keyboard was separated from the physical computer. The QWERTYkeyboard arrangement was adopted by manufacturers for the ComputerKeyboards. Once again, the slight advantage in speed for the Dvorakkeyboard did not make up for the long learning time. The Dvorak keyboardis available for computers but only occupies an insignificant share ofthe market.

Thus, the main keyboard layouts had as their central concern the speedof the typist and developed their systems in response to this concern,but they had opposite goals. The intention of the QWERTY system was toslow down typing speed while the Dvorak system was to speed up typing.The Dvorak and QWERTY designers never paid any consideration to thedifficulty of learning the keyboard. To a new learner of the keyboard,both the QWERTY and Dvorak systems appear as random arrangements thatmust be painstakingly learned through repetition.

Other keyboard layouts have been proposed using a three row arrangementof letters, for example: U.S. Pat. Nos. 943,466 (1909), 1,336,122(1920), 1,342,244 (1920), 1,506,426 (1924), 2,080,457 (1937), 4,519,721(1985), 4,613,247 (1986), 5,352,050 (1994), 5,498,088 (1996), 5,836,705(1998), 5,879,089 (1999), 6,830,396 (2004), 6,965,372 (2005), 7,008,127(2006), 7,104,711 (2006). These keyboards presented a typist with anapparently random arrangement of letters because the purpose of thearrangement was typing speed with no consideration to ease or speed oflearning.

U.S. Pat. No. 4,927,279 (1990) separates some of the vowels from theconsonants and arranges the letters in alphabetical order. This patenthas a plurality of keyboard designs some of which order the vowelsseparately from the consonants and have a different number of rows thanthe standard three for various designs. The purpose of thesearrangements is speed, not ease of learning.

A foreign patent makes a colored keyboard by line using the QWERTYkeyboard design AU 201201000915 (2012) but this does in anyway enablethe typist to learn the keyboard faster. This is the only patentdiscovered that has any use of color connected to the keyboard.

In a study of computer users, the average was thirty-three words perminute to transcribe a document and the rate for composition wasnineteen words per minute. This indicates that the overwhelming majorityof computer users are not typing at any great rate of speed. Therefore,improving anyone's rate of typing from sixty-five to seventy words perminute for a skilled typist by having the typist learn a completely newkeyboard arrangement is not a worthwhile endeavor that offsets thedisability in quickly learning the keyboard. In contrast, providing akeyboard that is easier to learn and easier to use would provide asignificant savings in learning times for beginning typists and aid slowtypists.

Numerous keyboard layouts have been proposed that are physicallydifferent from the three row arrangement of the QWERTY keyboard. Alongwith the different arrangement of the physical keyboard is a differentarrangement of the letters. The first of these was U.S. Pat. No.1,260,543 (1918) which employed some eighty-one keys of variouscombinations of numbers and letters. This was followed U.S. Pat. No.1,292,319 (1920) which employed keys arranged in a circular fashion.Each of these keyboards was designed to maximize speed of typing and didnot consider ease of learning. Subsequently, a large number of designshave been patented that are different from the three-row 10-9-7,sequence of alphabetic keys. However, none of these designs appear to beless efficient than the three row design of the QWERTY keyboard.

Over the decades typing has changed from a skilled trade of secretarialwork to a mass skill such as driving a car. Today, children in gradeskill learn keyboarding skills in the seventh grade, if not earlier. Themass use of cell phones and computers has made using a keyboard almostuniversal for all professions. Thus, the QWERTY keyboard system's randomarrangement of letters now presents an even greater barrier andconsiderable waste of time, effort and money learning a keyboard layoutmeant for a mechanical keyboard of the 1900's.

Based on the above, there exists a need in the art for a keyboardarrangement of letters that enable the beginning learner and any user toquickly and efficiently identify the position of each letters on thekeyboard. In order to accomplish this, the letters must be arranged in amanner that takes in to account the learned knowledge of the user, thatis, the learned order of the alphabetic sequence of letters and thedistinction between the vowels and the consonants.

SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSURE

The primary object of the invention is to provide a Computer Keyboardthat is easier to learn.

Another object of the invention is to provide a Computer Keyboard thatis laid out in an intuitive manner familiar to any reader of the Englishlanguage.

Another object of the invention is to provide a Computer Keyboard thatwherein the alphabetic letters are laid out in a logical fashion.

A further object of the invention is to provide a Computer Keyboard thatthe alphabetic letters are laid out in a non-random fashion.

Other objects and advantages of the present invention will becomeapparent from the following descriptions, taken in connection with theaccompanying drawings, wherein, by way of illustration and example, anembodiment of the present invention is disclosed.

In accordance with a preferred embodiment of the invention, there isdisclosed an apparatus for entering alphabetic data into a computer orother electronic or mechanical devices comprising: a keyboard whereinthe alphabet is arranged in a logical order, a keyboard wherein thevowels are grouped together, a keyboard wherein the vowels are allplaced on the left side of the keyboard, a keyboard wherein each vowelhas the same color code, a keyboard wherein the consonants are arrangedin groups, a keyboard wherein the consonant groups are arranged fromleft to right in alphabetic group order, and a keyboard wherein the eachconsonant within a group has a specific color code.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The drawings constitute a part of this specification and includeexemplary embodiments to the invention, which may be embodied in variousforms. It is to be understood that in some instances various aspects ofthe invention may be shown exaggerated or enlarged to facilitate anunderstanding of the invention.

FIG. 1 shows the prior art of the Allen keyboard;

FIG. 2 shows the prior art of the QWERTY keyboard;

FIG. 3 shows the prior art of the Dvorak keyboard;

FIG. 4 shows the layout of the keys of the First Embodiment.

DRAWINGS REFERENCE NUMERALS

11. Shows the vowel letter group A, E, I, O, U;

12. Shows the consonant letter group B, C, D;

13. Shows the consonant letter group F, G, H;

14. Shows the consonant letter group J, K;

15. Shows the consonant letter group L, M, N, P, Q;

16. Shows the consonant letter group R, S, T;

17. Shows the consonant letter group V, W, X, Y, Z;

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 depicts the Allen Keyboard U.S. Pat. No. 1,857,14 (1876). Thekeyboard has five rows of letters. The English language vowels, plus theletter “Y” which is occasionally has a vowel pronunciation of “e” incertain words such as “city,” are the bottom row of the key board. Thefirst row up from the bottom starts with the letter “B” and theconsonants are thereafter in alphabetical order right to left and bottomto top.

FIG. 2 depicts the QWERTY keyboard. The name of the keyboard is derivedfrom the letters on the left hand side of the top row. The letters arearranged in a format that was designed to slow down the rate of typingon early mechanical typewriters. The placement of the keys has nological sequence relating to the order of letters in the Englishalphabet.

FIG. 3 depicts the Dvorak keyboard U.S. Pat. No. 204,028 (1936) whereinthe consonants are positioned; the arrangement of the letters shortensthe length of stroke of the most frequently used letters in the Englishlanguage to increase typing speed. The placement of the keys has nological sequence relating to the order of letters in the Englishalphabet.

FIG. 4 depicts the embodiment wherein the consonants are positioned; thekeys are arranged in a logical sequence relating to the understandingand order of the letters in the English alphabet. The vowels are allgrouped to the left on the keyboard and color-coded of the same color.Group (11) consists of the vowels A, E, I, O, U all of the same color.The consonants are then arranged in groups in alphabetical groups fromleft to right from the right of Group (11). Group (12) consists of theconsonants B, C, D all of the same color; Group (13) consists of F, G, Hall of the same color; Group (14) consists of J, K all of the samecolor; Group (15) consists of L, M, N, P, Q all of the same color; Group(16) consists of R, S, T all of the same color as Group (12); Group (17)consists of V, W, X, Y all of the same color: each group of letters hasa different color-code with the exception of Group (12) and Group (16)which share the same color.

ADVANTAGES

In accordance with the foregoing descriptions of the difficulty oflearning the QWERTY keyboard several advantages of one or more aspectsare as follows: the letters of the keyboard are laid out in anarrangement that is apparent to all readers of the English language.This makes learning to type a more intuitive matter based on theforegoing knowledge of the typist, rather than a rote memorization ofthe position of each letter keystroke through repetition. The beginningtypist or a typist familiar with QWERTY keyboard will immediatelyrecognize the logical arrangement of the letters in the embodiment ofthe new design. The typist will easily determine the general locationand then the specific location of any letter. Thereafter, the typistwill progress from easily indentifying individual letters, tofamiliarity with the location of all keys, to touch typing. Theadvantage of the new keyboard is that it significantly reduces theproblem of the lengthy period any person must train to learn theubiquitous QWERTY keyboard.

Accordingly, it will be seen that the Computer Keyboard can be appliedto a variety of applications, including but not limited to, standardtypewriters, electric typewriters, stand-alone electronic keyboards foruse with personal computers, computers using a screen for touch entry ofdata, electronic smart phones and smart pads and any other device nowexisting or invented in the future that will enter alphabetic data.

Further, the Computer Keyboard can be employed in dual characterkeyboards that also use written symbols such Chinese/Japanese/Arabic.The Computer Keyboard would also provide these users with a logicalarrangement of the letters consistent with their learning of the Englishlanguage.

While the invention has been described in connection with a preferredembodiment, it is not intended to limit the scope of the invention tothe particular form set forth, but on the contrary, it is intended tocover such alternatives, modifications, and equivalents as may beincluded within the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by theappended claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. An apparatus for entering alphabetic data into acomputer or other electronic or mechanical devices comprising: akeyboard wherein the alphabet is arranged in a logical order; a keyboardwherein the vowels are grouped together; a keyboard wherein the vowelsare all placed on the left side of the keyboard; a keyboard wherein eachvowel has the same color code; a keyboard wherein the consonants arearranged in groups; a keyboard wherein the consonant groups are arrangedfrom left to right in alphabetic group order; a keyboard wherein theeach consonant within a group has a specific color code; a keyboardwherein two consonant groups have the same specific color code.